Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Seven contestants enter, one sashays away

Whew, Mother Ru was really putting us THROUGH it! The wait for Season 6 was excruciatingly long, and the
show had done such a masterful job building the anticipation with the cast reveal, social-media content, and killer trailers. I was
honestly a little worried. Could the premiere live up to my insanely high
expectations? But after Monday night’s episode, I absolutely think we’re in for a
fantastic season. The queens are fierce, the show has made some clever tweaks,
and perhaps most importantly, we have double the Pit Crew. We are already
winning!

click to enlarge

The big twist in Episode 1 was the fact that it was actually
TWO episodes. The new queens entered the Werk Room,
as usual, but the number stopped at seven. That’s when RuPaul
explained that they were starting the show off with two groups of queens, and
that of the 14, only half would be participating in Week 1, with the other half
squaring off in Week 2.

This is a brilliant switch, and part of why I love this
show. Historically it has been virtually impossible to really get a sense of
all the new queens when a season first starts. When you have a dozen-plus
contestants it’s difficult to keep track of them, and it’s even more
complicated when you’re talking about drag queens -- viewers have to
identify/bond with both the male and female versions of each competitor. By
focusing on just seven queens this episode we got to actually spend a little
time with each one of them, and to form some early opinions. In the past you’d
be able to do that for the queens who were in the bottom and top of those early
episodes, but the majority just got lost in the middle.

And frankly I think some of the contestants were counting on
that vast, safe middle ground to keep them safe for at least a few weeks. Not
with this new format. You could see the look of terror on several queens’ faces
when they realized that they just went from a 1 in 14 chance of being
eliminated to a 1 in 7, with practically a third in danger of going home. I bet
that more than one tuck popped when that lightning bolt hit.

So, great twist, even if it meant having to wait a whole ‘nother week to see several of the queens in which I’m most
interested (including Courtney Act, Bianca del Rio, Milk, and Rochester’s Darienne Lake). In the meantime, here are my impressions of
the queens in Group 1:

Adore Delano is
going to be divisive -- she already is in my little viewing party. Adore is the
drag persona of Danny Noriega, who was a semifinalist years ago on “American
Idol.” I find Adore’s giggly brat shtick charming,
and I think much of the attitude is just playing for the cameras -- it seems to
be delivered with a knowing wink. What concerns me about Adore is that she
seems unprepared for this competition (she even said she only brought like four
or five gowns), and that she may be expecting her previous reality-show
experience/notoriety to carry her. In any other season she might be right. But
the competition is VERY stiff this time, and she already seemed a little rattled by the end of
the episode.

Ben Delacreme is an absolute delight and one of my top
picks of the season. Ben has a very specific, dizzy housewife character she
works with -- think Lucy and Ethel combined -- but she
does it SO well. She’s razor sharp, gives amazing face, and has killer personal
style. Judge Michelle Visage worried that Ben’s character could become tiring
very quickly, but even Ben gets the danger inherent in it -- she refers to
herself as “terminally perky.”

Gia Gunn was more or less the bitch of
this group, and frankly, I was left cold by her. Gia is relying on her fishy looks and her outrageous
fashion (that hula-hoop-sized handbag was a hoot), and was awfully quick to
make disparaging remarks in the talking-head interviews. But, hey, it’s a drag
competition; I am fine with some shade. I’m just not convinced that Gia’s got the wit to pull it off terribly well. Plus, she
delivers it with an irritating, nasal voice that I found grating. Not a fan,
although there were moments in “Untucked” where I saw
some likable qualities shining through.

LaganjaEstranja is
similar to Gia, in the fact that there is a loud,
self-satisfied façade going on, but I think underneath there’s more to Laganja. She made a hell of an entrance with her death
drops, and I love her colorful, playful style. She’s also quite funny. But she
is very “on,” almost to the point of exhaustion. Even RuPaul
said that she’s trying way too hard, and needs to just trust in herself. With Laganja it’s not difficult to see a kid with a lot of
talent and a lot of smarts, but someone in desperate need of
approval/attention. I think the show is setting her up for a redemption edit,
and I welcome it. She’s got some rough edges that need sanding down, but
I think she’s talented and has a real “it” factor.

April Carrion is
my dark horse for the season. I initially dismissed her as just another pretty
but uninspiring Latin queen, but she’s got oodles of potential. Yes, she is
gorgeous. But she’s also got an adventurous sense of style and lots of
ambition. This is a queen who is doing some interesting things with gender and takes chances.
She was given arguably the hardest assignment in the main challenge and she nailed it, coming up with something unexpected. She also seems like a
sweetheart. Very interested to see more of this queen.

Vivacious had me
roaring with laughter, both intentionally and otherwise. Her entrance was a
perfect “Drag Race” moment, with her fake alien head Ornacia
giving us WTF and the inability to open the costume following that up with a LOL. Her photo shoot also provided some “bless her heart”
responses, but I thought she did fine on the main challenge. One thing’s
for certain: Mother knows how to work a goddamned runway. And I could listen to
the endearing string of nonsense coming out of her mouth all night long.

Kelly Mantle came
into the competition with huge expectations -- she is already a fairly big deal
in the national/international drag scene, and has an extensive list of showbiz
credentials. Unfortunately, this show might not have been a great showcase of
her talents. I think the change in format threw her for a loop. I think she
expected to be able to coast for at least a little while, but the sudden
pressure and an admitted lack of sewing skills led to a fairly uninspiring look
for the runway (and a fairly bad photo shoot as well). Still, I liked what we
saw of Kelly, and felt bad for her.

The past tense in the preceding paragraph was intentional,
because Kelly was the first queen cut after falling into the Bottom 2 opposite
Vivacious. (That second spot was somewhat controversial -- while Kelly’s “Downton Abbey”-inspired look was pretty obviously doomed, I
thought Vivacious’s Mary J. Blige
goes “Game of Thrones” look kind of worked, and the dress had specific
callbacks to Daenarys. Adore’s
was a straight-up mess and she knew it.) The lipsynch
to Madonna’s “Express Yourself” sealed the deal, as it was clearly more in
Vivacious’ wheelhouse (Kelly also seemed to struggle a bit with
the words). On the good side, Ben won the challenge for his elaborate glued
dress in homage to “The Golden Girls” (complete with cheesecake), and April was
praised for taking chances.

Kelly going home first basically proves that this season,
nobody is safe. For one, she’s already got a legit career and serious name
recognition. She’s a pro at this, not some club queen just giving it a shot. Secondly, several of the spoilers I read had her going far, even all the way to
F3. That suggests that there’s no reliable leak out right now, and I’m
delighted about that. (Predictions: of this group, Vivacious will be next to
go, followed by either Adore or Gia. I expect Ben,
April, and Laganja to make it fairly far, and I will
be sad if/when any of them get eliminated.)

Guest judge Adam Lambert did a fine job, and I loved him
flirting with April. I will confess that I’m confused as to why Santino continues to be a judge on this show, especially
given his bafflingly high praise of Gia’s runway
outfit. He’s supposed to be a bringing a fashion eye, right?

Finally, a few notes on “Untucked.”
1) I can’t believe it’s no longer the Interior Illusions Lounge! My worldview is crumbling. (My viewing
party also noted that Absolut no longer seems to be a
sponsor; hmmm…) 2) I think the producers expected more drama out of this group,
particularly Gia, because the discussion was a bit of
a snooze fest. 3) The most worrisome part of the episode was Gia’s blatant attempt for camera time by bringing up her family
struggles, which was then immediately coopted by a
teary Laganja. We have hit a point on this show where
the queens know what the cameras want, and they’re giving it to them in the most calculated way possible, like the kids on latter-season "Real World." I’m not
saying that any of that was insincere -- it definitely seemed like Laganja has issues with his mother -- but it was
difficult to not see the whole scene as a bid for attention. Perhaps it’s time
for the producers to shake up the “Untucked” format
as well. The main episode showed that it can be a real
boon when they try something new.

Next week: we meet the second seven, including hometown girl
Darienne Lake! And Courtney Act continues to freak
out a nation of straight men who refuse to believe that she is not a biological
woman. (Seriously, folks, THAT is a fishy queen.)